


Winter with wolves

by tehhumi



Category: Firekeeper Saga - Jane Lindskold
Genre: Animal Death, Fluff, Gen, Pre-Canon, Siblings, not graphic just food animals
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-17
Updated: 2019-12-17
Packaged: 2021-02-26 03:27:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,083
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21836695
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tehhumi/pseuds/tehhumi
Summary: Firekeeper and Blind Seer growing up together.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 8
Collections: Yuletide 2019





	Winter with wolves

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Syrena_of_the_lake](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Syrena_of_the_lake/gifts).



Firekeeper looked up as a new scent entered the den. The winter was cold, but she was warm as she nursed a fire in the same den the One Female would nurse her pups. The air outside had carried the smell of snow. The den was suffused with the pack’s smell, but most of it was old as the pups had not bothered with the den since summer.

This new smell was fresh blood, and almost as exciting, Blind Seer. Firekeeper’s brother was nearly two years old, and far more confident this winter than he had been the last.

She was lonely sometimes in winter. The pack ran far and fast, chasing scarce game for far longer than two legs could run. And though most of the year she would sleep near her siblings, the smoke from her fire in the small den bothered their sensitive noses, and it clung to their fur even after they left.

The fresh blood was not to be ignored either. Winter was lean eating, for Firekeeper most of all.

“Blind Seer! How went the hunting?”

“Very well. A moose fell half-through the ice, and was weak by the time it struggled to the bank.”

A whole moose! Even the rest of the pack couldn’t eat _that_ in moments. And if it had been weak, the full pack might not have been there to bring it down. “Where was that?”

“Not far. A half-hour’s run from here, where the river runs rough.”

Firekeeper knew the place. “Is there still meat?”

“There was still some when I left. Bright Nose is guarding the kill, and will sing it out to the rest soon enough.”

“Then I will go now.” It was near nightfall, and the night’s chill had been setting in. After much hard work, her fire had just grown big enough to eat sticks wider than two fingers. Firekeeper would have to put it out before she left, and spend long rebuilding it when she came back before she could sleep.

But the winter nights were long, and she would wake at dawn even if she spent half the night awake. Meat was more urgent than sleep, and she would never catch something as big as a moose on her own. And this was close, so she could get much of the good meat and eat it before the other wolves reached it.

“Run fast.” Blind Seer yawned and stretched out in the den. He was one of the few who found the novelty of a warm floor worth the nose blindness that came with the fire, trusting his eyes to see any danger in time.

“I wouldn’t have to, if someone had told me sooner,” Firekeeper said as she kicked dirt over the fire with her feet and tied her arm-furs back on.

“My kill, my meat.” Blind Seer grinned. It was a fair proverb. Though he had doubtless not been the only one involved in bringing down the moose, still he had been there and Firekeeper had not. So the ones had made the kill ate first, and called the pack only if there was more meat than they could eat themselves.

“But you still come to my fire,” she said, and playfully flicked his ear as she ducked out the entrance. By the time he stood up, she was out of reach, and not worth chasing down for a game. Especially not when Blind Seer knew just where she’d come back to.

_Spring_

One evening, Firekeeper and Blind Seer were relaxing and talking about the pack. The Emergence of the new pups would be soon. It was only the second Blind Seer had gone to other than his own, but the experience was familiar for Firekeeper. It was always exciting to meet new pups, but she knew what to expect. And these would be the first pups sired by this One Male, after the previous had died late last winter.

Blind Seer asked, “What do you think they’ll be like?”

Firekeeper said, “Dumb and fat and small and fluffy, same as all the other pups. Most of them will grow out of it though.”

“Most of them?”

“Some of them will unfortunately stay stupid all their lives," she said seriously, " They’ll do okay though, because my stupidest siblings also never lose their fluffy baby tails or their adorable baby blue eyes, so the rest of us still like them.”

“Hey!” he snapped.

“It’s alright. Stupid wolves can make up for it with brute strength. And you are _very_ fluffy, which we all enjoy in the winter.”

“Better fluffy than naked and hairless!”

“Is that true? Then I guess you don’t mind if the mats in your fur stay there forever.” Firekeeper stood up from where they had been lying beside each other.

“I can get mats out myself.”

“Not if they’re stuck in place with burrs.”

“Only an idiot would go through the brambles and get covered in burrs.”

“An idiot like you were last spring?”

“I had never seen them in snow before! I know better than to walk through them again.”

“I suppose even deer learn that a howl means wolves are nearby, even if they don’t know the words.” Firekeeper acknowledged, “But a naked two-legged wolf has nothing for brambles to stick to, and can go through the thicket and bring back bunches of them without stinging my mouth.”

“Don’t you dare!” Blind Seer leaped up to wrestle Firekeeper down, but she ran away.

“You said you liked being fluffy though!” Firekeeper had a small head start, but the other wolf was rapidly gaining on her.

It was hard to talk as they chased, but Blind Seer called out “Bald troublemaker.” Firekeeper just kept replying “Slow and fluffy!”

Eventually they came across a spreading oak, rather than the pine trees they’d been running through. Firekeeper swung herself up to the low branches. “Fluffy stupid slowpoke!” She called down, knowing none of the other wolves could climb trees as well as she could.

Rather than slowing down though, Blind Seer ran straight at the tree. At the last moment he leapt up and knocked into her. They both fell to the ground in a tangle.

“I do think the new pups will be fun,” Firekeeper said after she had recovered her breath.

“Yes, and you’ll have someone your own speed to play with.”

“You like playing with pups just fine!"

"Maybe, but they won't be even as strong as you for months yet."


End file.
